I got that concept from this article and this section:
Systematic shredding of long-standing “do your job, keep your job” cultures in the last 20 to 30 years of the 20th century eviscerated the psychological contract between employer and employee, even as employers complained about the remarkable demise of employee loyalty. Since 1978, CEO pay has increased 1,000%, compared with 11.9% for average workers. CEOs now make 278 times as much as the average worker, up from 20 times in 1965. Trust in government has fallen from about 70% to under 50% over the same period.
Although, admittedly, I’ve written about the erosion of employee loyalty and CEO trust as well, sure. Along the way, I’ve also talked about company loyalty, the penchant of senior leadership teams to spend all their together, and the general decline of trust in the workplace. I’ve spent a bunch of time on these topics. I’m no expert, but it’s meaningful stuff we should discuss more.
The logical reality of “Do your job, keep your job”
I do think the concept still exists at some places. A majority of places? Probably not. But some, yes. Here are the different kind of “termination” buckets I’ve seen over my years working and how valid they seem to be, to me at least:
Performance: Valid bucket. If you are not performing, you should be piped.
Revenue erosion: The bucket sucks, but it’s valid. Companies exist nowadays predominantly to please shareholders, not provide a great place to work (or even an income). If their inputs drop, their outputs need to drop. The biggest output is your salary.
Politics: This is a common reason for people getting canned, especially in the last 10 years. It’s “valid” in the sense that most US states are at-will, so if a boss doesn’t like you or doesn’t like how you dress or smell or something, you can get fired, yes. That’s how it works. You can also leave when you want too! But I do think there are an increasing amount of firings not for “cause” (i.e. performance) but for some bullshit perception of culture thing. I’ve lost some jobs for performance, and some jobs because the bosses didn’t like me or relate to me.
Where it gets a little dicey…
We have a very fraught society these days between racial discord, #MeToo, the pandemic, ongoing climate change, etc. Life is great and beautiful and better than it’s been in 200 years, yes. But there are still some real problems out there.
One concern you see a lot is that every company has some guy named Mike, who grabs ass, smacks ass, says the n-word, talks about “homer sexuals,” etc. But because he drives revenue/sales, he never gets fired. There is always an excuse. It’s always brushed away. Meanwhile, there’s a girl named Rachel in project management who stays at work every night until 8:30pm, has little to no social life, and because she talked back once in a meeting, she’s gone.
That’s where I think the “inequality” side of how firings work comes into play. We all know the inequality of rich vs. poor; don’t need to belabor those stats. But there’s an inequality to people within the same organization, and that causes frustration. People will think: “I thought I was supposed to do my job, and then I could keep my job?”
A noble thought, but it doesn’t work like that. In the eyes of executives at mid-size and larger places, you keep your job if you produce big-time, or if you move trains/move piles of shit off the plates of the execs. Otherwise, “doing your job” means essentially nothing. You could be gone tomorrow. In that way, it’s a nice little metaphor for life, isn’t it?
What if firing is a good thing?
It can be, and it can get you out of a toxic environment.
Could we fire people in a more compassionate way?
It’s possible, yes, but very complicated.
How does one keep their job in modernity, then?
Hell if I know, guys. I’ve lost maybe 3 of my last 4 FTEs.
Here’s what I’d say though:
- Relentlessly produce (and even then, no guarantees)
- Deflect for the decision-makers (same)
- Do not “bring your true self/passion to work”
- Realize that, as an employee, you don’t have many rights
- Do your job but always have an eye on something else or a toe/foot in another concept
What else might you add?
